WHAT! 18 cents a kwh? Are they firing the boilers with magic unicorns?So I am trying to understand your usage....if I am reading everything correct you are using about 83 kwh a day...now that is very high but as you say, and I can see it, you have heating needs for animals, and other farm function requiring power, but wow...and the prognosis is for ever higher bills..... You are going to need to get medieval on that bill......or on those charging such prices.... I don't know what would be easier, but I know what one would be more fun.Don't always assume there meters are correct, just last December a friend called me up. The bill was 3 or maybe 4 times what it should have been and it was not a estimate, the meter had been read. They couldn't figure out what happened. I came over just to see if maybe he left his block heater ( or 8 of them) plugged in or something stupid, called up the company to dispute the bill, had to send them a picture of the meter reading and got them agree that a mistake was made, they sent someone out to do something ( I wasn't there) and a new revised bill was sent out...its likely rare that there is a meter problem,but it can happen.

Last edited by peppercorn on Mon Mar 13, 2017 12:42 am, edited 1 time in total.

Yes, and wait for it peppercorn, they say that those prices will be rising every single year for the next five years! EVERY Single year.. Do you know what they signed for the payout for our solar and wind.. they are paying them 80 cents per KWH...

Do you know what they sell our "extra" power for to the states.. 1.5 cents per KWH..

But the Bleep-Bleep buggers sold out X amount of our system for "profit" and that means they sighed contracts that said, NO matter how much we lower our use.. they get to adjust the fun little line so they get to make their "proven signed by contact profits"

So in a nut shell.. the screaming you are hearing from this province, its real.. As a friend of mine said to me.. She is currently paying more for her power on her farm (in winter) then she is for her Mortgage montly.. insane.. and she heats with wood..

wow....I would normally say you need to be looking at disconnecting and going solar, but with your consumption.....there is no way, 83 kwh is just a bridge to far....I think you are in serious trouble......everyone in the province...... I am going to go find another bill to post, its likely fading from the collective memory of Albertans... but someone might remember the days when we owned our own utility companies...as opposed to them now owning us.

Its will be a combo Peppercorn, we are moving the stove to propane, we are moving one area to small winter only pellet stove with solar lighting for that building. we are building a bigger different greenhouse with more passive solar heating for winter. We get good winds and so we will most likely do a small wind power.. and of course wood heat

But all said and done, we are looking to reduce the use, possible replace some of the outbuildings to solar or other ways.. take more canning to propane would help as well.. having said that, we agree with you.. we don't think we can go off grid with the way things are set up..

However as you said, these cost do not just run my house.. and there are returns that we get only because we put that out as required.

You know I have not seen a 80+kwh a day bill here in Alberta I suspect it would be nearing the 400 dollar amount, if you look at that bill I posted the actual electric charges were 25 dollars and the bill total was 93.00 Same thing going on in Alberta, just not quite as bad as we havnt yet got the peak/off peak variable pricing gouging going on yet (but its coming) and few heat their hot water tank with electricity in Alberta as most homes have natural gas available so that part of the bill is moved to a lower cost fuel. What I am saying is we have smacked ourselves up side the head in Alberta as well. Here is how it used to be, this bill is from 98, I seen the writing on the wall regarding utilities around 99 and began planning then to move off grid, though it was a long slow process to get there.This is how good we had it when we owned all the utilities, The bill used to come out every 3 months in the country. So that total 101.00 is for 3 months of power. Roughly 34 dollars a month. Im not making this up, that's the actual bill. So I paid roughly 400 dollars a year, and I had a electric stove back then. I knew back then just how good we had it, I think it was 2002 when it changed for me.

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The Alberta government passed legislation to privatize in late 96 if I remember right, but it wasn't complete until somewhere around 2002 and the bill just when up from there. I was already working on reducing my bill back then note I had it down to 11.8 kwhrs per day , had only compact florescent lights back then. When I try to tell people how good it was, people don't believe me now!

I was heading over to a friends todays and again on the radio news were stories about power costs in Ontario, this must be the flavour of the month or something for reporters. Since I was going to the place that had the abnormally high power bill last Dec, I asked them if I could take a picture of it...I am sure meter problems are rare but just to show that it can happen here is the bill...Note the off the chart bill in December. So it does happen. When disputed the power company agreed to a charge roughly equal to the previous bill. I know the meter wasn't replaced, I would really like to know why, but the power company gave them no reason, maybe it needed calibrating?, just a wag.

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Of note on that bill is the stunningly consistent consumption pattern. The Only fluctuations occur in the winter months, when the run time of the furnace is dependant on the type of winter we are having, I don't believe any forced air furnace uses less than 2 kwhrs a day even in a mild winter day in Alberta, but can when the weathers bad use maybe as much as 6 kwhs a day. I forgot to take a picture of the back of the bill, but 15.60 was the charge for power used during the month of Feb, and 53.40 was just made up charges. If no power was used you will still get a bill nearing 50.00 a month ( 600 a year) in Alberta, The bills are so front end loaded that in trying to consume less you will get no benefit passed a certain point.